CHAIRMAN
Our Silver Anniversary year has arrived and it is a great tribute to our Founding Fathers and many, many others that we have flourished so mightily since our foundation.
The Society has numerous monumental achievements to its credit. In particular, it has created a body of knowledge and expertise exemplified by our Bulletin, our Registers and by the free advice we give to the public.
A major anniversary is a time to look forward as well as back. We cannot rest on our laurels especially given how different the world is today compared with the way things were in 1989. For some time now, Council has been thinking about our future and about ensuring that our organisational structure, our procedures, our exposure to risk and personal liability, our public accessibility and our dissemination of information are appropriate for the digital age.
All our success is down to our volunteers and, as Chairman, I cannot repeat too often how grateful I am to all those who have been volunteers and to all those who are volunteers today.
Our future depends on a continuing supply of volunteers. We need more volunteers and you may find that you are approached to help!
I hope for a large turnout at our Anniversary Conference in Greenwich. The extended programme will include many excellent talks and visits and I am greatly looking forward to the occasion and meeting many of you there.
Frank King
SECRETARY
Council has submitted the Society’s application to become a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO) to the Charity Commission. The case for becoming a CIO was explained fully in Council’s November paper (circulated with the Dec 2013 Bulletin). In brief, becoming a CIO will limit our exposure to risk and will not affect members’ or the public’s experience of the Society. The character, objects, and soul of our Society remain unchanged.
In terms of next steps, our application appears to be progressing to schedule. It remains Council’s intention and plan to place before the 2014 AGM the necessary CIO resolution(s) for approval. Assuming a vote of approval, the Society will, when all necessary administrative arrangements are complete, legally transfer into its new CIO structure. The transfer itself will not be noticeable to either members or the public.
The CIO application required nomination of the inaugural Trustees. The current Trustees were so nominated. Should any current Trustee not be re-elected at the 2014 AGM (s)he has agreed to resign as a CIO Trustee, and any newly elected Trustee will be appointed, by the re-elected Trustees, as a CIO Trustee – thereby ensuring democratic continuity.
Notification of the 2014 AGM: The AGM will be held on 25 April 2014 during the Greenwich conference. A formal note including the CIO resolution(s) and relevant background will be sent to all members in due course.
Call for 2014-15 Council nominations: Our Constitution decrees that Council serves for one year, terminating at the AGM. The Constitution requires the following be elected at the AGM:
- Honorary Officer of Chairman;
- Honorary Officer of Secretary;
- Honorary Officer of Treasurer;
- At least one and not more than four other Council Members.
Nominations for the above must be made in writing and received by the Secretary (Peirce House, Charing, Kent, TN27 0HU or secretary@sundialsoc.org.uk) by 10 April 2014.
Chris Williams
BULLETIN
At the risk of being boring, I still need many more votes for your ‘Most Enjoyed Article’ from the four 2013 issues. You can vote for up to three articles. I’m particularly short of input from overseas readers – it only takes an email!
Preparation of the June Bulletin, which will have a special theme of ‘decoration on sundials’, is now well advanced. But I could still make use of a few more examples of decorative elements on dials to fill some small corners (anything up to three-quarters of a page). So, if you know of a really decorative dial, please send me a picture and a few words giving its details.
The March Bulletin contains details of two books on sundials from Poland – many congratulations to the authors on getting to publication. But where are the books from English authors? Surely it is time for another publication, be it a coffee-table book or a full academic study!
John Davis
REGISTRAR
A few more dials to seek out, please, if you want an outing when the weather improves. Some should be easy if you are in the area; some may be more problematic!
1. Church Row Sundial, Wandsworth Plain, London. A very good west declining vertical of 1723 in a first-floor centre blank window.
2. St Michael and All Angels, Otterton, East Devon A well carved recent stone vertical dial ‘Hora est Benefaciendi’.
3. Red House, Bexley, Kent (National Trust). Horizontal on pedestal inscribed ‘SOLUS’ (from an old photograph – hope it is still there!)
4. Kettlethorpe Hall, Lincs. East-facing stone vertical on south corner of a brick wall. The house has been owned by a family who took command of the First Fleet to Australia and more recently, occupied by Douglas Hogg. The cleaning of the moat was one of the examples of MPs’ expenses claims which aroused public ire during 2009. So access may not be easy, but the dial is well worth recording. I have an old photo if you want it for identification purposes.
5. Linden Lodge Special School for the Visually Impaired, 61 Princes Way, Wimbledon Park SW19 6JB. A fine and unusual equatorial, apparently designed for time-telling by touch.
6. Sundial Cottage, 79 Athenaeum Road, Whetstone, Barnet N20 9AL. Vertical on east gable of south wall.
7. RN Museum, Portsmouth. A brass horizontal believed to be a memento of Nelson’s wedding to Frances Nesbit, in 1787, on Nevis. An interesting dial which may not be easy to photograph. Maybe find a helpful member of staff to remove it from its case?
8. Ormesby Hall, Middlesborough. We have a P&G heliochronometer, SRN 6796, but no photograph. It is kept privately indoors, but it would be good to have at least a photograph of its fine carved pedestal in the Rose Garden.
9. Also at Ormesby Hall, there is said to be a gateway to the west of the house, the piers topped with ball sundials. These are unrecorded and worth a report, please.
10. Donnington Brewery, Stow-on-the-Wold, Glos, have an equatorial dial on their publicity flyer. Is it really there?
11, Southwark Cathedral. I have an old photograph of a dial on a bulbous pedestal. Possibly it is SRN 2884, but we have no photo in the Register. Confirmation would be useful.
12. The Vicarage, Milnrow, Rochdale, horizontal dated 1664, in the garden (British History Online, Lancaster Vol 5, 1911). A phone call in advance might be prudent!
John Foad
EDUCATION
I have recently raised awareness of the BSS at a number of mathematical events I have attended. I collected back copies of the Bulletin from Jackie Jones in November and have given out one copy to groups of practising teachers. This, I hope, will raise awareness of the mathematical content in the Bulletin and encourage teachers to do more dialling in schools! About 90 copies have thus been put into circulation.
David Brown kindly wrote a great three page article for SYMmetryplus, a mathematical magazine for young (and not-so-young!) mathematicians. In it, he posed a number of questions, the answers to which will appear in the next issue, thus raising the profile of sundials again. If you would like a copy of this, please send me an email (address below) and I will see what can be done (no promises!).
We are working on a pdf version of Make a Sundial and we hope this will appear on the web site at some point this year.
To raise awareness of dials and the BSS to the general public it would be great if members of the BSS would contact their local press and write about dials with some pictures of local ones. David has produced a suitable letter which is reproduced later in the Newsletter. All you have to do is write in a bit about some of your local dials and send it off to your local press with a picture or two. Details of what you could include are given in the pro forma letter. Again, I would be delighted to hear from anyone about how we can do more for education, so please do not hesitate to get in touch at education@sundialsoc.org.uk with any ideas that you have.
Peter Ransom
MEMBERSHIP
We would like to welcome a number of new members. Frank Hay from Edinburgh; Clem Rutter from Kent; Nigel Rainton from Surrey; Mark Kingston from New Zealand and Geoffrey Lane from Oxfordshire.
Jackie Jones
SALES
Sales are very slow at the moment – very few orders since the New Year and the expected pre-Christmas rush simply did not materialise. All our sales items will be available at the BSS Conference at Greenwich in April.
Elspeth Hill
MASS DIALS
I received a letter addressed to Edward Martin, who died a couple of years ago, which reached me via his daughter-in-law. It was a query about ‘petals’ on a church in Norfolk and the correspondent had guessed, correctly, that they didn’t constitute a mass dial. This was an interesting petals, being rather crudely drawn – we usually ascribe them to geometric exercises but there have been other vague suggestions as to their use or significance. I keep them in the files for reference in case of repeat queries. If anybody knows about these designs, please let me know.
Irene Brightmer sent in five dials from Austrey in Warwickshire. Colin Lindsay had also sent in five, but a different five and only three ‘overlapped’. So: (5×5)/3 = ~8 i.e. eight dials to be found there and we have found 5+5-3 or seven, so far! Austrey is a bit remote from our regular recorders so it might be some time before we can check it out.
I have had an offer from a real archaeologist to help with the entry of dials into the Mass Dial Register, and John Foad has organised a separate entry programme for him. It will be interesting to see if it works and we can get the backlog of entries reduced. There are over two thousand to go!
It is hoped to get the Mass Dial Registers into the Library shortly. They have been printed up in double-sided page format but have yet to be bound. They should be to hand at the Conference but I may be able to persuade a local printer to bind them up for us soon.
No snow this year, so I checked out a local church, previously overlooked – only just in time – as it had been sold the previous month! No dials but it had passed into charitable hands.
Tony Wood
SILVER JUBILEE
Wall calendar: This is available from the web site. Apologies for the slight delay in posting this up. 2014 is here and the Greenwich Conference is fast approaching.
Sundial Cake Competition: Any shape, size, ingredients etc. so long as the finished confection is sundial related. Judging is on Friday April 25th, followed by consumption.
Press release: As a Society, we need to increase our membership. Publicity is a vital tool, so there follows a starting-point for a press release that we hope all members would wish to make use of. Adapt it as you like for your own area, but do, please do your bit to promote BSS.
The document below is also available from the BSS web site www.sundialsoc.org.uk
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The British Sundial Society’s
SILVER JUBILEE
Have you ever wondered whether that sundial in the park, or in your garden, or on the wall of a notable building or church is really more than just a decorative ornament or is it a genuine scientific instrument? And why does it never seem to tell the ‘right’ time? Is it old, and perhaps have a substantial history? Is it new, so why would anyone want a sundial when digital clocks are so evident?
The answers to all these questions and many more sundial-related ones have become the passion of a growing band of people from all walks of life. Take a look at some of these notable sundials nearby:
Here, add as many as six easily-accessible local sundials and their locations, trying to give a mix of horizontal, vertical, polyhedral, ancient, new, etc. with some photos that include people.
Also try to add some local topicality such as a local maker, a story behind a dial, a school sundial, etc.
This year the British Sundial Society celebrates its 25th anniversary with a special annual conference at Greenwich, the home of time and longitude, from 24th to 27th April. Newcomers would be particularly welcome and can find details of the Conference and plenty of information about The British Sundial Society on its web site www.sundialsoc.org.uk
What started as a small number of enthusiasts working alone is now a nation-wide organisation of some 400 members including several from overseas linked, in turn, to their own national sundial societies. The BSS has a smart, prestigious colour Bulletin published every quarter, has published several highly-respected monographs relating to sundials and time-keeping, and has assembled an ever-increasing catalogue of British sundials and scratch dials. The Society’s aim is simple but profound – to educate the public in the science and art of gnomonics. Speakers can be found to enlighten and entertain your own clubs and societies, and experts can be contacted to advise on your sundial projects and queries.
If you want to know more about the Society’s activities, and how to join, look at the web site for details. The BSS always welcomes new members, and they will find that they will be amongst a group of novices, experts, historians, craftsmen, with a wide range of ages and experiences, who are, above all, ordinary but enthusiastic folk. There is something for everyone in the BSS.
Meanwhile, why not go on a sundial safari and track down some sundials in your area? You may make discoveries, you will certainly learn a great deal, and perhaps you will become hooked.
Provide a name, address and phone number so that the local press/radio/TV can get in touch with you. Consider also spreading the release to local and even specialist magazines.
Sending the information to a named person is much better than just sending it to ‘The Editor’ and do be prepared to be persistent, with follow-up phone calls, checking that they have received your press release, and asking when they are going to put it out. Don’t be shy – media people are generally pretty thick-skinned.
David Brown
BSS PHOTOGRAPHIC COMPETITION 2013-14
Members will be aware that the photographic competition is normally only run every two years, with the most recent being at the Edinburgh conference last year. However, it has been suggested that, as 2014 will be the 25th anniversary of the Society, we might consider running a special photographic competition and this has been readily agreed.
Even now, it is still not too late to submit up to three entries for the competition being held at Greenwich. The entries will be judged by members attending the conference.
Please use entry forms that were included earlier in the September and December 2013 issues of the Bulletin, or, alternatively, a copy of the entry form and the competition rules may be found as a download from the BSS web site.
Please submit your entries to me, by 17th April 2014 for documentation and preparation for display, prior to the conference. Any last minute entries, however, will be accepted at the conference itself, (although not too many, please!) I look forward to receiving your entries.
Ian Butson
NEWBURY ONE DAY MEETING
Now is the time to make a note in your diary and calendar and pin a notice to your kitchen cabinet that the ever popular Newbury meeting will be on Saturday 27th September 2014 at Sutton Hall, Stockcross near Newbury. Details will be in the next Bulletin and on the web site.
Look forward to seeing and meeting you all. Have a great Summer – Dialling.
David Pawley